Financial stagnation: Plus bus lines in Brandenburg remain unaffected!

Financial stagnation: Plus bus lines in Brandenburg remain unaffected!

Beeskow, Deutschland - The Brandenburg Ministry of Transport has secured the financing of the existing plus bus lines by 2026. However, this also means that no new plus bus lines are co-financed, which is due to the tense budget situation. Hartwig Rolf, the head of traffic in the Ministry, explained that the kilometer flat rate of currently 40 cents is not increased for the time being. This decision caused sharp criticism in the opposition.

Especially Nicole Walter-Mundt, the traffic policy spokeswoman for the CDU parliamentary group, expressed resentment about the lack of expansion of the plusbus offers, which currently comprises 45 lines. It demands that the kilometer flat rate increase to one euro because the last adjustment was already made in 2017. Tim Jurrmann, the Mobility Officer of the district of Oder-Spree, also criticized the stagnation of the flat rate and referred to the increasing costs for driver and diesel. Jurrmann suggests taking an example in the country of Saxony, where plus buses are funded with up to 50 percent of the operating costs.

challenges of the Plusbus lines

In Brandenburg, the support for the operating costs of the plus buses, on the other hand, is significantly lower, with only 10 to 15 percent funding. This leads to fears among local citizens, such as Robert Czaplinski von Beeskow, who calls for adequate economic incentives, since operators could no longer start holding points for economic reasons.

The Plusbus was introduced in 2014 to overcome the small-scale public transport structures in Brandenburg. Today it is active in 13 out of 14 counties and is to be extended to 50 lines by 2024. The last line, number 440, was only introduced in February and connects Fürstenwalde with Beeskow.

Financial framework conditions

In Brandenburg, the operation of road passenger traffic is the responsibility of the 14 counties and four independent cities, while the financing of racing services is provided by the state. The state supports the municipal responsibilities based on the public transport law and the public transport regulation. The plus buses run in regular bars and offer direct transitions to the train, supplemented by call buses and citizen buses.

In addition, Brandenburg grants financial allocations for call buses and citizen buses that complement conventional line traffic. The funding is carried out according to the guidelines of the Ministry of Infrastructure and State Planning. Applications for funding must be submitted to the State Office for Building and Transport and are subject to a multi -stage process, registration, application, fundamentally and proof of use to ensure that the funds are used specifically and economically.

The current developments illustrate the challenge of making public transport in Brandenburg future -proof and at the same time living up the financial framework. In view of the ongoing debate about the financing of new lines, it remains to be seen whether there will soon be changes in politics.

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